Tagged: shortcut

Did you know that if you click on the rotate icon in the Control palette in Adobe InDesign, which selects the text for the field, and enter a number, then hold the Shift key down and press Enter, the rotate input field stays highlighted so you can type in another amount for the object to be rotated – allowing you to get the rotation amount just right without having to go back to the Rotate icon again. Of course you could just free rotate the object by selecting it and hitting the “R” key and dragging the handles of your object, but it’s difficult to be precise using Free Rotate.

If you’re always in a rush, you can bypass the PDF Export Options dialog box in Adobe InDesign by holding down the Shift key when choosing a setting from File>PDF Export Presets, just name the file. This is perfect when you have a lot of InDesign files to export with the same settings.

OK, so you’ve known for a long time that Command + Tab switches applications. And you’ve long since figured out that Command + ` (backtick, also known as the ~ key next the number 1 key) will switch between windows of the active application. But have you noticed that it doesn’t work in Photoshop? To switch between open windows in Photoshop, simply use Control + ` (backtick) to switch between windows.

If you have the occasion to combine all your layers in your Photoshop document, yet still have access to all the layers at the same time, you can use this little trick to do it. Create a new blank layer on top of all your other layers and hit Command + Shift + Option + E. This merges all the visible layers onto that new layer you created AND keeps all the old layers intact for further adjustment.

Once you’ve used F12 to view your opened Dashboard widgets, it’s a pain to have to grab the mouse and click the “+” sign to open the Dashboard bar to view other widgets you have installed. Luckily, there is a keyboard shortcut: Command = (equal). This will toggle the Dashboard bar on and off.

Did you know you can change fonts, font sizes, leading and more in Adobe InDesign using the arrow keys? Simply click in the field you want and use the arrow keys to increase measurements, select the next or previous font, etc.. Perfect for making small adjustments.

When you have content placed in a frame in Adobe InDesign, you can press Command + Option + C to resize the frame to the size of its contents – text or graphics. You can also hit Command + Option + E to stretch a graphic to fill a frame. If you want to keep the graphic scale proportional, add the Shift key. Once your graphics are placed in a content frame and sized to your liking, you can center the graphic in the frame by pressing Command + Shift + E. These commands may seem obvious, because they’re in the menus and in the manual, but I’ve found that many designers and production artists are so used to Quark’s key commands that they forget to learn new ones.

When you’re in Adobe InDesign and you have a text block that you have carefully set right-aligned tabs for using the tab bar, you’re somewhat stuck with the tab setting if you need to resize the frame. The tab setting stays where it is regardless of any width adjustments you make to the text frame. You can make it much easier on yourself simply by hitting Shift + Tab. This will automatically put the text after the tab to the far right point of the text frame regardless of the width of the text frame. This of course makes it much easier on you if you need to make that frame a bit thinner or wider.

When using Adobe InDesign, you can send any item to the back of a layer by pressing Command + Shift + [. To bring the item to the front, use the ] key instead. Take the Shift key out and you’ll move the item up and down in the layer order one at a time.